


Standing Stones

by alamorn



Category: King Arthur: Legend of the Sword (2017)
Genre: Cunnilingus, F/M, Ritual Sex, Sex Magic, Woman on Top
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-26
Updated: 2019-03-26
Packaged: 2019-12-18 13:05:04
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,500
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18250421
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/alamorn/pseuds/alamorn
Summary: Marrying the land doesn't seem all that bad, given the ceremony.





	Standing Stones

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Ashling](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ashling/gifts).



> Happy Smutswap!

There was a drought in the north and flooding in Londinium, and nothing about brawling with Vikings had prepared Arthur for natural disasters. Or at least not on this scale — he was used to stretching food for one street, finding places to stay for twenty people. Londinium had two hundred  _ thousand _ that needed homing until the waters receded, and none of them farmers. The manors and duchies surrounding wanted nothing to do with them.

The midlands were groaning under the weight of feeding the north, and going without the grain crops would starve them all in the coming winter. The treasury still hadn’t recovered from Vortigern’s folly, which was what Arthur had decreed was the name of the tumbled stones that had once been a tower.  _ That _ at least, seemed to be getting the correct amount of water. They’d started dumping the nightsoil on the folly, and it was already blooming with new life. Soon it would be a lovely grassy knoll, built entirely of malice and shit.

It seemed a fitting legacy for his uncle.

At this rate, Arthur’s legacy would be absolutely nothing, because he would last as king for less than a damned year. And he’d pull out all of his hair before the six month mark.

“ _ Why _ ,” he complained, “can’t the water go where it’s supposed to?”

The Mage rolled her eyes at him from her seat at the Table. “You haven’t claimed the land yet. She will not suffer your arrogance.”

“Sounds familiar,” he quipped, but his heart wasn’t in it. “And how do I do that?”

“Magic,” she said.

“Obviously.” He cocked an eyebrow at her. “Want to be more specific?”

A muscle in her jaw jumped. “The land needs to know you. She’s lain fallow too long.”

Arthur looked at her, the mulish set of her jaw, and suspected, but wasn’t sure, that she didn’t like what she was about to tell him. After all, she always looked as if she would rather be elsewhere. It was only the fact that she  _ didn’t _ leave, though nothing bound her, that said otherwise. Or at least, she didn’t leave for long. He'd figured out her secret; she liked him, though she hated to show it. He could push her more than anyone else.

“Go on then,” he said, dropping into the seat next to her and letting his legs sprawl out into her space. She didn’t flinch away from him, though her glance skimmed over the length of the leg closest to her.

And then — she tilted her head and looked him up and down slowly enough that he felt it dragging over his skin, featherlight but undeniable. He didn’t shiver, but it was a near thing. “Ah,” he said, grasping her meaning without trouble. “And this isn’t an excuse to see me with my clothes off?”

She ignored him. “During the new moon,” she said. “Within the stone circle.”

Within the circle. Arthur didn’t bother to hide his grimace of distaste. “Will it hurt?”

She rose, a small motion of her hands bringing her cloak to fall neatly around her, obscuring everything but her face, pale and lovely in its sternness.“Magic always does. But there will be no snakes this time.”

“At least there’s that,” he said. 

The Mage hesitated a moment longer, and he considered grabbing her hand, just to know how it felt. Were she anyone else, he would have done it without thought. As it was, he let the moment pass. In another, he would have called her step towards him  _ hesitant _ . As it was,  _ measured  _ seemed a better fit. Her cloak brushed his thigh. Then another step, and she was solid and warm beneath it where her leg pressed into his.

He tilted his head back to keep her eyes. They always showed more than she wanted. “Should I bring anything, or just my irresistible self?” he asked, not quite repressing a smile.

“I’ll bring all we need,” she said, her cool hand cupping his jaw. Her thumb brushed over his lip. He opened his mouth, just a little, just enough to tempt, a coquettish move he hadn't used in years, and watched her consider kissing him. She decided against it, turned to go.

He didn’t want her to, so he caught her wrist, something he wouldn't have dared if she hadn't started it. He did his best to respect her space, but they were about to do some sort of ritual that he wasn't entirely sure wasn't an excuse to get his clothes off. He could allow himself a touch with his tease. “Should I bring Bedivere, make sure you’re not planning on slitting my throat and dumping me in a bog?”

She paused and turned, just enough for him to see the sharp line of her jaw. “Only if you do poorly,” she said, surprising a laugh out of him. And then she left. He watched her go, hands behind his head.

Well, it seemed being king wasn’t all bad. Whistling, Arthur set about his day.

 

The Mage’s hawk drew lazy circles in the pale blue sky as Arthur approached the standing stones. The drought had turned the the grass pale here, and it crunched under the hooves of his horse. Arthur dismounted and left his horse to graze as he closed the gap. It felt wrong to come to her on horseback. He was the king and she the mage, and so he should not be above her.

The stones shifted as he drew up on them; a trick of his eyes, he told himself, as the grey opened to reveal the Mage, kneeling in the center, swathed in blue. The air within the circle was different somehow; there was no water in the air, but neither did he find it as dry as he had outside the circle. Even the anticipation was enough to change the world.

And Arthur, summoning force of habit to overcome the grandeur of the moment wondered if  _ she _ was wet with anticipation too. “Fancy meeting you here,” he said, and the Mage looked up, her eyes unfocused.

“Strip,” she said, standing and shrugging off her cloak. She was bare beneath it, and Arthur’s hands itched to touch.

“You don’t want to know if I brought Bedivere?” he asked, and she tilted her head, face incurious. “I didn’t,” he said, beginning to undo the laces at his throat. “Wouldn’t want to shock the old man.”

“He’s seen worse,” the Mage said, and bent to pick up a small pot that she’d been crouching over.

He pulled off his shirt as she dipped two fingers in and withdrew them coated in thick blue. “You can’t leave me hanging like that. What have you done to poor Bedivere?”

She placed her fingers at her forehead, the edge of her hairline, then drew them down straight over her nose, her lips, her chin, down the soft, pale underside of her jaw, the vulnerability of her throat, over the dip of her clavicle, the flat of her sternum, down over the gentle swell of her belly and into the thatch of dark curls between her legs, connecting mind and cunt with a streak of bright blue. 

Arthur had grown up surrounded by naked women and considered himself less prone to foolishness around them than many men, but he found himself as dry of mouth and empty of thought as if he had never seen a breast before. He stood there stupidly as she approached him, and shivered when her wet fingers began to draw.

When she finished, she bent to wipe her fingers on the grass. His hand lifted without thought and hovered over the sharp press of her spine against her skin. She turned her head to look at him over her shoulder before she straightened, and then she said, "Lie down."

Instead, he slid a hand from her shoulder to her jaw, drawing her up to him before pressing a soft kiss to her lips. When he drew away, she was staring at him, expression unreadable. It was a different sort of unreadable than he was used to. If he were to hazard a guess, and he was, she was nervous. "I'm not a piece of meat," he teased. "I need to be wooed."

"Do you want to lick my cunt or not?" she asked.

"Well, when you put it like that," Arthur said, dropping to the ground, grass pressing sharply into his thighs and buttocks. He lay back, putting his hands behind his head and admiring the sharp length of her, accentuated by the woad carving her in half. His cock was already more than half interested, but the Mage paid it no mind as she stalked over him, swinging a leg over his face before kneeling gracefully.

He moved his hands to catch her rump as she descended, shifting her forward so her cunt was right above his mouth, but before he lowered her the rest of the way he took a moment to breathe her in. She smelled musky, but not overpoweringly so, and when he parted her lips, she was damp with anticipation. He wanted her dripping.

He drew the flat of his tongue over the length of her slit, enjoying the softness of her, the tang. So little was soft about her; it was a delight to find that this one thing was. He slid his tongue through her folds until he found the tight, hard nub that made a tremor go through her. Her hands slid into his hair, fisting tight, but doing nothing to direct him. Just hanging on.

Soon enough, she was dripping on his face, her hips jerking forward and back slightly. He focused his attentions more closely until she hissed and pulled his head back, her thighs trembling. "Too much?" he asked, smugly.

She said nothing, shaking her head and standing. She circled the clearing, speaking a language he didn't understand, so instead he propped himself up on his elbows and admired the shift of muscles under her skin, the sweat working its way down her back, the shininess of her inner thighs. No matter that he could hardly wring a full sentence out of her, her body couldn't lie. She liked him, little as she wanted to admit it.

When she made her way back to him, she straddled his waist, the first touch of her hand to his neglected cock almost a shock. When she sank down on him, she bit her lip. Arthur understood. He wanted to bite her lip too.

He'd always been a daring sort of man, so he put his hands on her hips, exploring the press of her bones, the softness of her skin.

With a roll of hips and thunder, she began to ride him and the sky opened. The water was cool and torrential; he had to squint up at her. Her hair was plastered to her head and neck, dark tendrils curling over her collarbones. And Arthur grew tired of letting her have all the control. He sat, hands sliding up her back to stabilize her as he moved, and dropping his head to her breast, where her nipple sat proud and hard, water dripping from the tip. He licked it first, and the water was sweet, before he fastened his lips over it and began to lave. 

One of her hands sunk into his hair, holding him to her. The other sank between them, to play between her legs. He could feel the movement of her fingers at the base of his cock when she came down upon him, but she was focused on her own pleasure, not his.

The rain grew fiercer, lashing at them, cold gusts that chilled everything but the point where they were joined. The Mage began to speak, her voice ringing over the rush of wind and water and blood pounding in Arthur’s ears.

He couldn’t understand a word she said. What he could understand was the shudder of her hips, the clench of her muscles around his cock, the focus in her face, thrown back to the sky. She was a woman on the precipice — of orgasm, of magic, they seemed to be one and the same.

And, as she’d bid him so long ago, he stayed with her, following her to that precipice without fear. The hand in his hair tightened to the point of pain. The hand at her clit quickened, then stilled. He felt his own release threaten, low in his belly, when the world — 

Changed.

The Mage tightened and spasmed. The sky cleared, bathing them in gentle light. Arthur’s hands clenched on her back, and he buried his face in her chest, willing there to be a moment longer, just a moment, of this bliss, where all his responsibilities and worries had melted away to the body in his arms, wet and abrupt and thrillingly alive.

“Do not look away,” she murmured in his ear, sounding almost desperate. He suspected this wasn't part of the magic.

With a deep breath to catch the rain fresh scent of her, Arthur tilted his head back to look upon the world around them. It existed still, when he had almost feared it wouldn’t. Fear and hope were two sides of the same coin, but Arthur wouldn’t spend this one, not yet.

The grass was green and lush, the stones steaming in buttery noon light, the sky a rich blue echoed in the woad that had melted and streamed under the rainy onslaught.

The Mage disentangled herself from him and stood, naked and unashamed. His seed dripped down her thigh, but she made no move to clean herself. She moved with purpose as she always did to the center of the circle, and there stood, head tilted back to the sky, arms spread wide, as if she could capture the sunlight within herself and be transformed, as she had transformed the land.

“Congratulations,” she said, “on your successful offering.”

He drew his leg up so he could rest his chin on his knee, suddenly almost shy before her. “You said it would hurt. That’s not the word  _ I  _ would use for what just happened, and if it’s the one you would, I did something very wrong.”

“You did everything right,” she said. “The pain will come later. You are bound to the land now. All bonds hurt eventually.”

He hummed something that she could take as acceptance, if she wanted. “That’s a bit dark.”

Finally she looked at him, and the light  _ had _ imparted some property upon her; she looked filled up and overflowing with it, a gentle sheen that he could scarce pretend was mere post-coital bliss. “All is balance. Pleasure begets pain begets pleasure. There is no use fearing it.”

“I didn’t say I was afraid,” he said, feigning insult. “But I would take a bit more pleasure first, if the pain is inevitable.”

“Come and take it, then,” she said. So he did.


End file.
